Polar Bears take action against Gazprom’s Arctic plans

Last night as we slept, a team of intrepid polar bears from Greenpeace visited Gazprom’s flashy headquarters in Moscow. At the same time, activists from Greenpeace in Germany set up a leaking oil derrick outside the Gazprom offices in Berlin.

Why, you ask, would such a sensible creature as a polar bear take such extreme action in the heart of one of the world’s biggest cities?

Simple. To demand that Gazprom, one of the world’s biggest energy companies, scrap it reckless plans to drill for oil in the pristine waters of the Russian Arctic.

Just the other week, Greenpeace International Executive Director Kumi Naidoo and a team of activists took direct action to stop Gazprom’s hulking oil platform Prirazlomnaya preparing to drill in the Pechora Sea. This rusting monstrosity could be the first ever platform anywhere on the planet that will produce commercial quantities of oil from the offshore Arctic.

Our Russian bears set up their very own Arctic sanctuary outside the Gazprom HQ, with activists locked on to gates, amid snow flurries and curious onlookers. In Berlin, a leaking oil pipe is spewing fake oil all over ice, reminding Gazprom just how difficult it would be to clean up an accident in the frozen north.

As I write, 10 activists in Moscow have been arrested by police. We’re doing our best to get them out as quickly as possible, but they’ve done this because the creeping industrialisation of the Arctic by the likes of Gazprom and Shell has to stop.

This means creating a sanctuary at the top of the planet to protect this unique region forever. It means banning all oil drilling and keeping the Arctic off-limits to industrial fishing. We can do it, but we need your help.

Ben is a staff member from Greenpeace UK. A keen ornithologist who has worked on many Greenpeace issues, Ben is head of the Arctic oil campaign. He lives in London and watches a lot of Arsenal matches.